


The light is such a short distance

by Orokiah



Category: Outcasts (TV)
Genre: Backstory, Canon Child Death, Canon Suicide, Character Study, Framing Story, Gen, Post-Canon, References to Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-20
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:41:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24165283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Orokiah/pseuds/Orokiah
Summary: Tate confesses the secrets of his past to Berger, but there are only so many he's prepared to share.
Relationships: Richard Tate & Julius Berger





	1. Chapter 1

In ten years on Carpathia, Tate has rarely involved himself in interrogations. He reads the reports; there's no file in Forthaven that doesn't first pass his desk. PAS he leaves to Stella, but for Josie Hunter. But for that one, regrettable incident. It did not end up in a file. It lives only in his head, the way so much else does.

This is his first as a suspect—as a prisoner. Berger knows this, judging from the smirk on his lips. He likes seeing his nemesis in chains, confined to this dim, stuffy cell. Tate has never been certain if he truly believes his own righteousness. If it's a calculated fiction, or he's merely convinced himself of it, lie lived so long it's turned into truth.

This much, at least, _is_ true: he believes he's won.

"My people," Tate demands, ceding what power he has left by breaking the silence. "Where are they? What have you done with them?"

Berger raises a calming hand. In his white linen shirt, so often his uniform of choice, he's the picture of civility. The bloodshed his allies brought seems nothing but illusion.

"No need for concern, Richard. They're being looked after. They're being held in quarters, for now. While we determine who we can trust." He settles back, arms folded. "Stella has been very helpful in that regard."

"She will never collaborate with you, you worm."

"Come on," Berger says. "You're a pioneer. You know how quickly people adapt, when they have to. Aren't you proof of that? Aren't we _all_?"

Tate's jaw is twitching with the effort of biting back a response. Berger's eyes stray, noting it.

"Oh, if you're waiting for Cass Cromwell—or should I say Tom Starling?—to come find you, don't bother. We picked him up yesterday. Sneaking in through a tunnel, mounting a half-baked, one-man _rescue_ mission. His devotion to you knows no bounds. I'm not certain it's entirely platonic."

He examines his nails, affecting boredom. "On which note, let's discuss Jack Holt..." He whistles. "Now there's a man trying too hard to be something he's not. He swings like a fence in the wind. I forgave him, for his betrayal, but he's going to turn on me. Again. First chance he gets.

"It pains me, Richard, it does...but someone has to set an example to the rest. I'm going to have to recommend he be gutted like a fish."

Tate rears up, a hiss in his throat. The cuffs yank him back, metal jangling, digging into the skin of his wrists. Berger smiles to himself, satisfied he's crawled beneath it.

"What do you want?" Tate asks, once he's composed himself. "You have my city. You have my people. I have nothing else to give you."

Locked alone for numberless days, he's considered with cool dispassion what his fate might be. A show trial—torture—a public execution. All are probable, with the brutes Berger has aligned himself with, who were welcomed with open arms into Forthaven, only to start shooting. He's afraid of humiliation, of pain, would not be human were he not: but he's not afraid of dying. Death is the easy option, always. Survival is harder. Living is harder still.

He doesn't believe in an afterlife. If lasting existence is to be found, it's in the memories of those who knew us. It's in the genes, passed from one generation to the next. Something of him will live on. But he will never see Melissa again, in that unique and complex arrangement which made her the things she was. The woman he loved, who loved him in return. Who didn't love him enough to stay; to look for the light, amidst the deepest darkness.

He has never told anyone how much he hated her for that. How much he hated himself, for thinking it.

"Knowledge is power," Berger says glibly. His face hardens. "I need truth, Richard. As Cass Cromwell demonstrates, your files can be a somewhat, shall we say, _edited_ version. That is no longer an acceptable state of affairs. I want your secrets. I want _everyone's_...and I know you have them."

"What you need is leverage," Tate retorts. "And my secrets are not for sale."

Berger leans across the table that separates them, eyes lit with a preacher's fervour. "Confess to me, and I will give you absolution. I will be your confessor. I will grant you that favour. Be honest with me, and I will be honest with you. That I promise you."

"Are they planning to kill me?"

He hesitates for a second. And then—"Yes." His eyes dip, as if in defeat. "They believe you're a disruptive influence, not a suitable candidate for our brave new world. I want you to know that I argued against it. We've had our differences, you and I...but I have never wished you harm."

Berger's universal spirit help him—Tate _believes_ him. "Fleur Morgan?"

"Gone." His lip curls in disgust. "Disappeared, with the rest of them."

Tate hears it as _safe_. A knot inside him unclenches. He lets out a long, low breath. Knowledge is power. Berger is right, about that.

"A truth for a truth," Berger says. "I've given you what you want. Give me what _I_ want, and I will use it, to keep them safe." He means himself, of course. The lie is a kindness, in its way. Tate does not correct him.

"I will buy you time. It's all I can do."

Tate lays his palms on the table. The surface is cold, resisting the heat with every ounce of its will. White sand dusts the floor, the sheet-metal walls, like the ashes of his dead. It hangs heavy in the air, burrows everywhere, no matter how often they clean. The adults made masks, in those early days. Some of the children, raised in recycled air, had breathing difficulties. Their lungs were ill-suited, unadapted: it was the first thing he corrected, in that batch of ACs.

He's built a new life from the ashes of the old, more than once. Even now, he finds that he hopes for another, however short it might be. If this is how Berger wishes to toy with him, the game he wants to play: then let it begin.

"Where would you like me to start?" he asks.

He didn't board the transporter with the intention of one day becoming president. The captain of CT1 had already been assigned that role. Tate had studied his genetic code, admired many of the man's qualities. He'd isolated several, for use in his projects. He collected genes the way his grandfather had collected stamps.

Captain Viner was a passionate orator, a strong believer in justice, with a ruthless streak that every psychologist agreed would prove an asset, on an alien world. It proved more of a liability, on a spaceship—he didn't even make it halfway.

Stella Isen wasn't head of anything, at that point. She was a world-renowned neurologist, part of the team behind Deep Brain Visualisation. It was for that reason the crew called her in, when Viner was found in an airlock with his throat slashed to the bone. She, in turn, called Tate.

"I'm a geneticist," he said, "not a criminal profiler. You can't expect me to determine from a blood test which one of us is a murderer."

"DBV is not a substitute for due process," she said. "If you want me to ignore every law that exists to protect us from the abuse of my own technology, you can at least help me narrow the field."

He found Stella prickly, back then. Somewhat cold, understandably. He knew her from the evacuation project, knew she'd left behind a husband and child. Her code intrigued him, too, but her words intrigued him more. They lived in a revolving tin can, the dying gasp of their species—and she still believed in human rights.

Stella put her foot down on the DBV, risking a spell in the brig. Instead, she made a deal: she'd use it to prove guilt beyond doubt, once suspects were found. With only Viner's own DNA found on the body, the science she and Tate lived their lives by was found wanting. Stella was undeterred.

She appointed herself assistant to the security chief: examined quarters, retraced steps. She liaised with the passengers, assessing their opinion of their late captain. She was tireless. Tate found himself thinking that she was even more impressive than her resumé suggested: a woman of many talents. He said as much to Melissa, who looked at him with pity.

"That's a woman with a broken heart," she said. "The day she stops swimming, she's going to drown—and she knows it."

Tate found himself with an unexpected talent, too. He hadn't taught since the lean years of his post-grad, but he'd retained the ability to explain things in simple language, in a way people seemed to trust. It was a necessary muscle to flex, with fear gripping the ship. Rumours flew that Viner's ghost had been seen, haunting the decks. It was the top story on the screens, day after day. The killer got spooked, recognised Stella's brilliance the way he did: one night, while she was at dinner, they broke into her quarters, trying to scare her off.

Tate asked Cass Cromwell to keep an eye on her. Stella was not impressed. She called him a patronising oaf. He's always enjoyed her dry sense of humour.

"I don't need a bodyguard," she repeated, in the wreckage of her suite, as Cass hovered nervously behind her. A janitor-class AC, one of the decommissioned Tiggers, was sweeping up the plexiglass. He was undercover, in a way; Tate wanted to see how he fitted into society. His name badge said _Dave_.

"The pig's ear someone's made of this place says otherwise," Cass said.

Stella arched an eyebrow. "Perhaps I'm just that messy."

"And I'm the pig's pyjamas," said Cass. Tate tensed, prepared to step in, but Stella seemed tickled. She smiled at Cass. He grinned back, and turned to the AC. "Come on, mate. Hurry it along, will ya? We'll be in Andromeda by the time you're done."

Dave didn't make it much further than Viner, as it happened. He was one of the casualties, when they landed on Carpathia. You won't find his name on the memorial. Tate is the only one who remembers that he ever existed.

The security feed to the deck outside had been interrupted, as with the airlock. It suggested a member of the crew, with the skills to cover their tracks, but both Tate and Stella were sceptical. There were few on board who couldn't do the same, given sufficient time and motivation. CT1 was a ship full of genius; the seed-ship for the future of humanity. Only the best and brightest had made it onboard. The project had been rushed, with conditions on Earth deteriorating, but there was nothing slapdash about the vetting. Tate had personally overseen the lion's share of it.

He lay in bed that night, thinking about the photograph he'd seen in Stella's quarters, torn beyond repair. Could he have left Melissa and their boys behind, if he'd had to? How many others on board had made that same sacrifice...and proved unable to withstand it?

On his way to the mess hall the next morning, he took a detour that led him past the airlock. There was a young boy standing outside, nose pressed to the door in macabre fascination.

"You shouldn't be wandering the ship on your own," Tate said. "It's not safe." He bent to the boy's level, and asked, "Where's your mother?"

"Back on Earth," the boy said, in an accent that reminded Tate of his youth. "Same as me da." He added, downcast, "And my sisters."

"Well, I'm sure you must miss them. But they've given you a great gift, you know. You're going to see and experience things most people can only dream of. Clear skies, fresh water...the planet has _two_ moons. It'll be the most wonderful adventure."

"Then why'd the cap kill himself?" the boy said.

"He didn't."

"Are ye sure?" he asked, with a child's ghoulish relish, eyes flashing a dare.

Tate spent the afternoon in his lab, testing a theory. Stella studied the ship's oxygen consumption logs. Cass pored over schematics. In the evening, they went back to Viner's quarters. There were tiers of accommodation, even on this first voyage, where most people had been granted passage instead of buying it. The captain was of Berger's school of thought, when it came to the trappings of power: he had the highest. He had a lot of space. He'd customised it to his own requirements, which, it turned out, were quite specific.

"Commissioning your own clone so you could murder it and fake your death," Stella said, when Cass dragged him from the bulkhead. "Gosh. That must have been expensive."

Viner glared at her. Bruises shadowed his skin, crescent moons dug into his face. Perhaps he'd intended it to look like an accident, but his clone had not gone compliantly to its end. Fear was easy to remove; survival instinct quite another matter. None of the ACs ever wanted to die.

"There are at least two stowaways on this ship," Stella said. "The man you killed was one of them. We suspect the other is hiding on Deck 19. Your wife, I presume?"

Viner sagged in on himself like a deflated balloon. He nodded. Stella had been icy cool, but now her eyes filled with tears.

"How dare you," she said quietly. "How dare you _cheat_."

Like every CT, the ship had been designed with capacity to expand—procreation was never mandatory, but always encouraged—but difficult questions now arose. There were families on board, hundreds of growing children. Space was finite. Everything had its limit: oxygen, water, food. Did they have the resources to share with a man who'd lied, killed, and betrayed them? Were they not the very qualities they'd hoped to leave behind, in this fresh start?

Did they even deserve to survive, if they also abandoned the quality of mercy...and chose not to forgive?

A ship's council was formed to discuss it. Tate, to his surprise, was nominated as the civilians' representative. The decision was made. The ship was told that Viner had killed himself, unable to live with his shame. Tate slept soundly, woke early. He found himself drawn back to the airlock. Outside, unfamiliar stars spun slowly past. They piped birdsong into the intercom, at that hour, to make the ship feel more like home. It could scarcely have resembled it less.

There was no young boy there, this time. There was a man, hardly worthy of the name, sandy-haired and muscled. He'd been at the meeting, too. They stood side by side in that artificial dawn, and watched the ship turn.

"Did he struggle?" Tate asked.

"No," Mitchell said. "He was very quiet, in the end." His eyes, a piercing blue in the gloom, flicked to Tate. "Which way did you vote?"

He looked for the dark stain on the bulkhead, that exposure to vacuum hadn't managed to remove. He probed his conscience, like a wavering tooth. He found it clear. He said as much.

"First officer's going to be a problem." It was casual, a non-sequitur. "He doesn't have the stomach for hard decisions."

"The right decisions are more important."

"They're one and the same," said Mitchell. "Aren't they?"

"He'll get us there."

"And when he does, there's going to be an election." His lips formed a feral, toothish smile. "You'll have _my_ vote, Tate. If you're brave enough to stand."

Tate went back over Viner's genetic profile, wondering what he'd missed. He found nothing. Genes were only one side of the story. Viner was an ideal leader, on paper, but reality was not so black and white. The sacrifice of his wife had been too great an injustice. He'd forged an elaborate plan to start a new life with her, on a whole new world, abdicated his duty for his personal desires. He'd crumpled under the pressure of being responsible for so many lives; for the very future of the human race.

_Was_ it bravery, he wondered, or simply hubris: to think he could do a better job?

He still wasn't sure about running for president. But he knew who he'd want, in his top team...should it ever come to be.

"I've always found it interesting," Berger says, spreading his fingertips on the table. His nails are short, boxy stubs, recently clipped. "That you managed to make it onboard the transporter with your own family by your side. Did Stella never resent you for that..?"

Tate bristles. "Stella is not so petty. And Melissa was a fine geologist, as you very well know. She won her place, fair and square."

"My other point of interest—" The fingers draw into pincers. "The _aw shucks, I'm just a humble scientist_ schtick. Men like us don't get to where we are by serendipity. We claw our way up. We break noses, tread on toes. We _work_ for it. From the day I landed, you've acted like politics was something you somehow stumbled into. I've read the archives, Richard. The vote you mentioned? You won eighty percent of it. How else would you do that but build a base? You put in the hours, kissed the babies, made the speeches—"

"Well I do enjoy a good speech," Tate says. "Far be it from me to interrupt, while you're making one."

Berger scowls. For one, fleeting second—but it's there. His features rearrange themselves, back to beatific calm. "I chose my words poorly. I apologise." His head bows in supplication. "It was not my intention to besmirch Melissa. She was quite brilliant. Truly one of the—how did you put it?—best and brightest."

"Yes," Tate says. "She was."

"Which only makes it more of a puzzle, frankly... How a brainless ape like Cromwell ever won a berth."

"You no longer believe in second chances?"

"My beliefs are not in question here, Richard. Whereas you—your errors of judgement are _legion_."

"Perhaps," Tate agrees. "I've made mistakes. But I've never considered Cass Cromwell to be one of them."

He tugs down his shirt, stiff with dirt and blood, like the rest of him. It rustles like paper. His brain, playing tricks on his senses.

Berger's blue eyes light in triumph. "Then you admit it was you who falsified his identity. Perverted the course of justice. Bought yourself the loyalty of a trigger-brained thug."

"One of those things, certainly, is not completely untrue."

"He's a _killer_ , Richard."

"No," Tate says. "Not anymore. He will do anything to avoid going back to that dark place. It's what makes him such a fine PAS officer."

"How did you get him on the transporter? Who did you have to blackball—black _mail_ , to make it happen?"

"That was always more your wheelhouse, Julius...wasn't it?" He looks at Berger's clean hands, those freshly-shorn nails. " _A truth for a truth_. What are they doing with your DNA?"

Berger's mouth twists. His hands form fists.

"There's also the bruise in the crease of your left arm." He nods to it, smudging the skin like an oil slick. "A tell-tale sign of blood having recently been extracted. You might consider rolling down your sleeve."

"I've had some tests," Berger says, equanimity restored. But he does tug at his sleeve, discreetly. "Routine checks. A necessary precaution, given the killer virus your pet AC so kindly visited upon us."

"All good news, I trust."

"Oh, you're looking at a fine specimen of humanity. I'm going to live a very long life...beneath this beautiful sun." He lifts eyes and hands to the ceiling. It's winter grey like the rest, blocks even a hint of natural light. If it's possible to be both taunting and guileless, he's mastered it. He's so perfectly engineered, not even the Omega Project could have designed him.

"Your turn. Cass Cromwell. Another of your monstrous, Frankenstein creations."

"A common misconception. Frankenstein was the scientist. Not the monster."

Berger regards him with a skin-crawling sympathy. And says, "Isn't it possible to be both?"

Tate visited prisons regularly, as part of his work. It would surprise no one, to learn that early-pattern ACs were cloned from society's outcasts. Genetic samples, flippantly swapped for cigarettes; an hour or two of liberty, beneath a steel sky. Humanity has always exploited the captive, the vulnerable: sometimes for sport, sometimes advancement. The biggest sacrifice that science demands is morality. Ethics are the currency we use, to purchase progress.

The medical bay at Belmarsh had two identical offices, one next to the other. One belonged to the head physician. Its twin had no permanent resident, and only one distinguishing feature. There were frames on the walls, full of dead butterflies. They were a bright splash of colour in a white, lifeless space. They were also extinct.

London had been rocked by a storm that morning, citizens pinned in their homes by curfew. More than ever, the butterflies felt like someone's idea of a joke. A metaphor for humanity.

Tate was reading the psych report on Tigger 103, waiting for his transport home, when the door squeaked open. An orange-clad prisoner was shoved in by a warder.

"Oh, I'm not—" he began, to the closing door. He eyed the prisoner. He was young, barely out of his teens. His hands were red beneath the manacles. "Not a doctor," he finished. "Well, technically. Wrong office, I'm afraid. I'll call Dr Pearson—"

"Don't bother," the prisoner said. He sank into a chair. "It don't hurt that bad."

"Those look like radiation burns to me."

"Got caught in the rain, didn't I? Least I got my ten thousand steps in."

Tate closed his folder, and steepled his hands. "How, exactly, did that happen? There are safeguards in place."

"Funny thing 'bout informing on your friendly local kingpin..." He shrugged, unrepentant. "Their mates don't seem to like it."

They got to chatting, as Tate treated the burns. He had nothing else to do, with the day's samples stored and the transport running late. A new batch of ACs had been decanted that morning; they grew rapidly to maturity, but Tate had little to do with them, until then. His colleagues wanted to name them, but Tate feared it would personalise the process. Make them too human. He'd ignored their messages, soliciting suggestions like a parent might, for their newborn.

"It's been a pleasure," he said, on his way out. To his surprise, he meant it. He glanced at his phone. Julia Morgan's latest message. It said, with three question marks—he remembers that, quite clearly— _Cassius???_ He typed a reply, pointing out that Cassius Longinus had murdered Julius Caesar. When she sent back only another three question marks, he sighed and deleted the thread. Those who did not remember their history were, ever and always, doomed to repeat it.

He turned back. "Perhaps you'd consider taking part in our project. We're looking for certain genotypes... Those we think might benefit mankind."

"No offence, doc," the man said, "but take a look out the window. Mankind's fucked."

"You think we're beyond saving? Unworthy of a second chance?"

The man was much too young to look as pensive as he did. "I don't think _I'm_ worthy of it, I guess."

Tate had many contacts, back then. Favours he was owed. He pulled some strings, and read the man's file. Tom Starling had been in deep with the cartels. They recruited people with no hope, no ambition; just a propensity to violence, the inability to see beyond. They'd chosen badly, with Starling. He'd killed a child, an act that had changed him. He'd seen the light, atoned as best he could for his crimes. The mob was in disarray, thanks to him. He might well have saved more lives than he'd taken.

A man could rewrite his own story. Rewrite himself, if he chose.

Starling consistently refused to let Tate use his code. He'd given up enough of himself already. He was also scared of blood, not least his own. Nonetheless, Tate made a point of meeting with him, each time he visited the prison. They talked. Played chess. Starling taught him some rudimentary Russian, the ciphers and codes he'd acquired from his paymasters. He was witty, perceptive, humbled; a good man, who'd made the wrong decisions.

He had such potential—and he was going to spend the rest of his days rotting away in a cell, while the planet burned around him.

It wasn't difficult to arrange such meetings, when Starling spent so much time in the medibay. One week, a black eye; the next, cuts and scrapes. Train tracks of stitches. Ever bigger bruises. Broken fingers. An arm in nanoplaster. He never fought back. He felt he deserved what he got. Judging by the blind eye they turned to it, the prison governance agreed.

Tate, however, did not.

Three months later, he sat in his usual place, opposite Starling. He slid a file across the desk. Starling looked at him warily. On a nod from Tate, he opened it.

"The first ship leaves in seven months," Tate said. "I'd very much like you to be on it."

Starling's mouth fell open. His eyes moved back and forth, pages flicking, almost too fast to take in. His head was shaking, as hard as his hands.

"You're going to die," Tate said bluntly. "In this prison, on this planet. Either by your own hand, or someone else's. This you know." He watched Starling, blinking rapidly as he leafed through the papers. "If that is truly your wish, I will not stand in your way. But if you come with me—"

It strikes him only now, how prescient his choice of words were. How much like Berger he sounded. "You will be reborn. You will get the chance to start again. You deserve that, Tom..." He stopped. Corrected himself. " _Cass_."

"Cromwell?" Starling said, looking doubtful.

"According to my news feed, yesterday was the four-hundredth anniversary of the Battle of Marston Moor. It was the first thing that came to mind."

Starling laughed. "I ain't no brainbox scientist. I got no exams. What would I even do, on another world?"

"There'll be ample opportunity for you to find a vocation. You're young. Fit." He saw no point in glossing over it; ensuring genetic diversity was his official function. "Fertile...one assumes."

Starling blushed like a schoolboy.

"The ship needs more than Nobel prizes: it needs crew. I've spoken to the head of personnel. There's an opening, in the security team. It's yours, if you want it. It's nothing fancy. Checking IDs, inventory. Stowing equipment... You'd have to work your way up. Prove yourself."

"I will," Starling said. "I mean—I can. Course I can. I'll do anything. Whatever it takes." His eyes, dark and haunted, bored into Tate's. "I won't let you down... I promise."

Tate extended his hand. It was a lifeline. Cass took it.

"Welcome aboard," Tate said.


	2. Chapter 2

"There just happened to be an opening?" Berger sighs. Shadows dance around him. "Spare me, Richard, please. There are limited spaces on every transporter. It took me ten years to be granted one, and I was vice president of the _entire programme_..."

"And how many backhanders did you accept in that time? How many lives lost, because they weren't wealthy enough to buy their own survival?"

"That's rich," Berger says, without irony, "coming from the man who cites genetic diversity as a reason to bring a convicted felon along for the ride. A surefire way to avoid conflict in Utopia... What did you have on Singh? Who did he bump from the roster, to make room for your latest pet project?"

"The aspersions you cast are not only offensive, they're the height of hypocrisy. You never did concern yourself with the little people, Julius. The cleaners, the cooks, the guards... You were always much more interested in the VIPs."

"I was interested in ensuring our _survival_. Do you imagine we could have perpetuated the project, beyond that first ship, without the funds to sustain it? What would have happened to your precious diversity then?"

Tate scoffs. "You were in it for yourself. You played both sides. You'd have stayed on Earth, had it been safe enough to do so. You did, for long enough. You had your insurance: a slot reserved for yourself, the entire time."

"If that's so," Berger says slowly, "then at least no one else had their chance at life snatched away, when I took it."

"I doubt Aisling Burrows would share that assessment," Tate returns. "Who was more worthy of a place on Carpathia? A cockroach like you—or Daniel Isen?"

Berger smiles. It reaches his eyes, making it even more unnerving. "I will miss our sparring, Richard," he says fondly. And then he pushes back his chair.

The sound rebounds, screeching off the gunmetal walls. Primal fear shrivels Tate's stomach, for all his calm before. "Wait. _Wait_ —"

"Oh, we're not done. I have other matters to attend to. I'll let you rest. Gather your thoughts. There's _so much_ I still want to know." He puts a finger to his chin, deep in thought. "What really soured relations between you and Mitchell Hoban, for instance. I mean, ordering him to take out the trash is one thing..."

Tate goes still. "I don't recall filling you in on that."

"I've always had my sources. My good friend Jack tells me that Mitchell also suspected you of having an affair with his wife...Katrina, wasn't it..?"

There's a camera above the door frame, red light blinking incessantly. Berger glances round, and makes a signal. Boots thud outside, bolts scraping back. His reflection warps and twists, on his way to the door. It's less a confession booth than a hall of mirrors, in an old-Earth circus.

"What time is it?" Tate calls. The only reliable measure of it is the length of his stubble.

Berger turns his smooth-shaven face. "It's late, I believe. Just about midnight."

Tate almost buys it, until the door is opened. He snatches a glimpse of daylight, stabbing through a grille. By his estimation, it's the middle of the afternoon. The bolts shriek shut, power grid wheezing. The light sputters out, thrusting him back into shades of grey.

Berger’s lies look much the same as his truth. Ever the master manipulator. He can't resist.

Tate rubs a hand along the scratchy line of his jaw. He wonders how long it will take him: to lose the will to try.

He and Mitchell were never friends. Allies, yes: there was trust on both sides. What went wrong between them is a question with no easy answer.

The first night on Carpathia was spent huddled in the transporter, as a whiteout howled outside; dazed from the voyage, the difficult landing that had cost so many lives. With the bridge crew dead, the ship in disarray, Tate took charge. He stepped up—but it was Mitchell who stepped outside. He went to the mountains, brought back water, vegetation. His courage gave them strength. He was a hero, the natural choice to be head of the expeditionaries.

The first child born on Carpathia was named after him. A child who later died of C23. Perhaps it was an omen—if you believe in such things.

Tate can see early signs of tension, when he looks back. Mitchell was complicated. Capricious. He wasn't happy with the base assigned to him; he pushed for half a sector. He wanted to set up his own camp, outside Forthaven, to venture further, faster, for longer. He ruled with a rod of iron, pushed everyone's boundaries, the way he did Carpathia's. He mapped every inch of terrain, stamped his name upon it. Power and adulation went straight to his head.

He was the only other person in Forthaven who knew about Cass. Stella's role required plausible deniability, and while she surely suspected, she never pressed it. It was an accident: a mix-up with privileged files, while they were setting up. Cass kept his own, after that, safe where only he could find it. He was terrified that his new life would be over, when it had barely begun, but Mitchell promised to keep it quiet—and he did. He'd treated Cass like a bumbling child, before that. It settled into wary respect, after, for them both.

Mitchell saw a kindred spirit, in the ghost of Tom Starling. He appreciated a man who knew what it was like to get his hands dirty.

He thought he saw that in Tate, too.

The novelty of his discoveries gradually wore off, as Forthaven went from a ramshackle band of refugees to a functioning democracy. Days turned to weeks, settled into rhythm. Appetite for adventure, of the sort Mitchell thrived on, began to wane, especially once the virus hit.

Many of the plants found were edible, but they proved less popular than Terran crops, struggling to life in alien soil. The results were a taste of home, if often a poor one: wizened tubers, bitter berries, sour-smelling fruit that rotted on the vine. Whole freezers of livestock embryos failed to thrive, with no clear explanation. Nutritious, native food was a goldmine, but people had given up enough of the familiar. Entire industries sprang up, dedicated to recreating tea, and brewing ale.

There was no point in surviving if they preserved nothing that brought them joy: why else had they brought along beer, and vinyl records?

Mitchell wanted more, as usual. One day, the XPs set up shop outside Can 91, and gave out samples of a rival beverage. It produced a pleasant buzz, somewhere between alcohol and caffeine. Tate paid them a visit on his way to the hydroponics lab, Stella and Cass by his side.

"I trust Food and Distribution have certified it for human consumption," he said.

Stella peered at her glass, nose wrinkling. "It looks like curdled gravy."

"Well it tastes like shit," said Cass.

Needless to say: it did not catch on.

Mitchell had no issues, living off the land. Supplies prepared for him, as he struck out on his missions, returned untouched. He was the first to find space poppy, as it would later be dubbed; he was also the first to discover its hallucinogenic properties, when he and his squad set up a camp fire, and dared each other to smoke it. They brought it back to Forthaven. Use of it spread like a flu.

"You should try some," he challenged Tate, when he was called to his office to answer for it. "Break out of your box. Live a bit."

"I prefer my brain chemistry unimpaired," Tate said. "Much like my judgement."

"I certainly misjudged _you_ ," Mitchell sneered. "You and your rules."

"They're there for a reason."

"To keep us in line."

"To keep us safe."

"You stepped onto a _spaceship_ ," Mitchell said, incredulous, "bound for another planet. And you still think there's such a thing as safe?"

"I've reached my limit when it comes to taking risks," Tate said. "That time has also arrived for you. Are we quite clear?"

"Sure." He snatched back the SP, littering Tate's desk. "But I'm keeping this. Since there's no actual law against it."

Tate brought it before general council. They outlawed SP, except for medicinal use. The vote was near-unanaimous.

Mitchell Hoban, as ever, was the only dissenter.

What changed Mitchell, from a trusted member of his team, to a violent, paranoid rabble-rouser? He suffered radiation poisoning, on an expedition to the coast, which could not have helped. Then there was the substance abuse: the SP, and whatever else he ingested without proper testing. His life on Earth had not been easy: his corps was sent to Chicago, in the aftermath of the bomb, shortly after he enlisted. He never would talk about the things he'd seen there, and Carpathia did not insulate him from further trauma.

It's harder than you think, sometimes: what to tell people, and when. It's never the lies that damn us. It's the things we won't say.

The ACs might have been the final straw, yes. But Tate isn't convinced of that, either. Mitchell had no qualms about killing. Did he save them because he pitied them...or to massage his ego? Among them he could be a hero, once again—this time with a ready-made army.

Mitchell had very real mental health problems. That was not an excuse, for the things he did. It does not diminish them, to say so. Tate might have forgiven him for the insubordination, the attempted coup. But not for the terror he visited on his helpless, motherless child. The murder of Officer Williams; of his own wife. You ask why he lied about his death, covered up Fleur's culpability...

To protect her from the XPs? Because he'd helped create her? Out of gratitude, because she'd saved him from the same dilemma CT1 had faced, over Viner?

Or because he felt, deep down, that Mitchell had deserved it?

There are no easy answers to that question, either.

He first met Karina at the state opening of the new accommodation block. The construction brigade had been instrumental in its building. They lined up outside as Tate cut the ribbon. He gave a short speech, met with polite applause, and then made his way along the line, making small talk with the volunteers. Stella trailed behind, presenting posies of Carpathian myrtle. He stopped, finally, by Fleur. She looked like a normal teenager.

How appearances can deceive.

"Fine work, Miss Morgan." He'd not long lost his family; was careless enough to use her name. She blushed as he shook her hand, and thanked her for her service.

"I'll do everything I can to make Forthaven a better place, sir."

There was a fire in her eyes as she spoke: one he recognised. He felt a flush of pride, at how she'd turned out. He enquired about her ambitions, spent too long talking. Stella noticed his interest. Her clever eyes narrowed. Tate hurriedly moved on, so fast he stumbled across the feet of the young woman standing next in line. Her outstretched hand was warm on his arm, when she steadied him.

Karina was Fleur's best friend, old enough to be a PAS cadet—and Mitchell's fiancée. She was luminous, kind, a shining star. She explained to him, that day, how she wanted to fix things. Maybe that's why she was drawn to a man as broken as Mitchell.

She liked projects, as much as Tate did.

When you suffer enough, you become inured to it. Conditioned to pain. C23, his boys, Melissa. The loss of CT3 and 4, with all hands. Tragedy piled upon tragedy. Tate withdrew into himself, focused entirely on politics. He put a moratorium on cloning; there would be no more ACs, or attempts to breed livestock, except on the black market. He clung ever tighter to his vision of Forthaven, the one that directly opposed Mitchell's, because he believed in it. Because he had nothing else.

Those were dark, desperate times.

He was young enough to start again, but he was also responsible for thousands of lives. He was conscious of how it would look, for him to become involved with any of them. Forthaven couldn't afford for him to lose focus. He had to be the rock on which it stood, and so he made his own sacrifice. If he'd ever had hopes of anything else, with anyone else, he put them aside, with only a little wistfulness.

It's only human, isn't it: to wonder what might have been?

He and Karina grew close, as Mitchell unravelled. That much he'll admit. And if she'd lived... If she had lived... But it was not a line he could have crossed.

Perhaps he and Berger have that in common, after all. Oh don't look so surprised, Julius. Of course he knows about his relationship with Aisling. Of course Stella told him—did you really think she wouldn't?

It seems to make him angry. Or something else? Ah. Jealousy. That, he'd surmised already. Julius Berger has a blind spot when it comes to Stella Isen. He finally feels a spark of genuine emotion, for another human being...which she does not return.

There are lots of secrets in Forthaven. As Berger himself has admitted, Tate knows everyone's.

Did he really imagine his were not among them?

The light is such a short distance, but the darkness suffocates. It presses in on him, like a weight to his chest. Days pass, or perhaps only hours.

Meals and pails come and go, his dignity leaving with them. They lengthen his chains, allow him to the board that serves as a bed. He can't remember if there was a mattress there, before. He thinks briefly that he'll have to ask Stella, when next he sees her, before it hits him, a knife to the gut. Could he blame her, or Jack, for giving up and joining Berger, if that is truly what they've done? Survival involves compromise, more often than not. He finds no fault in that.

He doesn't think he'd do the same, whatever Berger claims. But Jack is young. Stella has Lily, and the promise she made to Aisling. Tate can afford the luxury of his ideals. He has nothing left to lose but his own stubborn pride.

There are secrets he will not confess. Things he holds close to himself, has never shared, not even with Stella. Fleur is one. This is another: that earlier forays into cutting-edge bio-engineering did not involve clones. There was a group, when he was at university, who experimented on themselves. On each other. They were daring. Brilliant. Stupid. They modified genes for appearance. Forced mutations. Created a library of traits from other species, that did not naturally exist in human beings. They changed eyes from blue to green, thickened skin into scales. Inserted a cat's sense of balance; an owl's night vision.

Or at least, they tried.

The recklessness of it makes him wince, years later. It ended badly, as such things tend to do. But it provided the basis for the AC programme, that arose from its ashes. If you _can_ change something, and change it for the better...then isn't it your solemn duty, to do so?

Tate cannot see in the dark. It wraps around him like a black hole, stealing his senses. His body might be floating in outer space, time-travelled back to the womb. He watches the red light, its mocking dot-dot-flash, to anchor him. His brain imagines it's sending a message. He reaches for his Morse code, to translate. It's an old biochemist's pun, amuses him to make. The smile dies on his lips as meaning scythes through that last, feeble defence.

_How arrogant you are_. _Taunting your jail_ _e_ _r._ _You can't win a game that you've_ _already lost_ _._ _This is_ _mate, not check._ _Y_ _ou_ _can no more stop them than you could a whiteout_ _._

His own face looms beside him. Is he desperate enough, he wonders, to beg it for help? But even the host force has forgotten about him, left him alone in the dark. He's adrift in that peculiar netherland between consciousness and oblivion. He speaks to and sees no one but himself, and he is far from the best of company.

"Let me be," he tells it. "Let me rest in peace," as he closes his eyes, and makes it disappear. When he dreams, he sees only places, instead of people. A lie he told Cass, out of kindness; another secret he will allude to, but never tell. Posterior cortical damage. A flaw in visual processing. He's never managed to recreate what he did to himself, to make it happen—much less fix it.

He will never see Melissa, or his children, when he sleeps. The borderlands of his childhood, the wasteland they became, make for scant consolation.

It was at the welcome party for CT5 that Tate first got to know Jack Holt. It's how he realised that they hadn't left as much behind on Earth as he'd hoped. It's where Jack learned to...but he's getting ahead of himself.

Every country of Earth had its stereotypes, based in truth. They are a nation of man, and these are theirs: Forthaveners are sombre, po-faced, earnest. His people are burdened by the things they've seen. They know, only too well, how to mourn. But they also, occasionally, have fun. There have been many dark days in their history, but there have also been days of joy. Weddings and births. Their annual celebrations: Landing Day. Arrival Day. The President's Day awards. The parties they held, on the rare occasions that a new ship landed safely.

It had been a long time since they'd had cause to celebrate, without caveat. Forthaven was a riot of colour and sound. There was music, blaring. Banners and paper chains, hung between containers like strings of pearls. They fluttered in the breeze like they, too, were dancing. Solar engineers contrived to turn panels into spotlights, shooting into the sky like lasers. Food and drink stalls jewelled the central square, scents suffusing the warm night air. People sang, let their hair down, mingled with friends both old and new.

Tate and Stella watched from the sidelines, enjoying the show. Fleur and Karina were dancing together, laughing gaily. Karina was pregnant with Linus, but it didn't stop her spinning like a whirling dervish, right into Leon's arms. Mitchell stood off to one side, face like thunder. He never did like her having friends.

"Not gonna ask the lady to dance, then?" Cass said, sidling up. He'd swapped shifts so he could make the party; was already tipsy.

Stella swapped a raised eyebrow with Tate. He cleared his throat. "I really don't think—"

"How's about it, Stella?" Cass swung his hips, an exaggerated motion that made a laugh bubble to her lips. "Wanna have a boogie with your favourite PAS officer? I warn ya: I ain't taking no for an answer."

"Just what every lady wants to hear," Stella said wryly. "Perhaps we should discuss your questionable grasp of consent." But she accepted his hand. "Oh all right. Since you asked so politely. But let me warn _you_ : I'm a demon on the dancefloor. You'll be very sore in the morning."

"Bloody hell," Cass said, as the music changed. "Who went and brought the Bee Gees?" He tugged her away. Tate watched them, felt a smile growing. Stella looked radiant, in that soft light. Happy: as close to it as she ever got. It was a good look on her. He should have let his walls down, and danced with her.

He wishes, now, that he had.

He caught a movement in the shadows. One of Mitchell's XPs came up to him, whispered a message. Mitchell's jaw tightened. His face turned whiskey sour when Tate went over, a question in his gaze.

"We've lost power to the beacon," he explained. "Dust in the panels, probably. Needs a sweep."

"Without it we have no prospect of finding out what's happening on Earth." He should have learned, by then: not to hold out hope. "It's a vital piece of equipment."

"Waste of metal, if you ask me."

Tate gave him a hard stare.

"It's my night off," Mitchell said, eyes trained on Karina. She was twirling with Stella, cheering Cass and Fleur as they danced in circles. "I'll get to it."

Perhaps he shouldn't have overriden Mitchell's authority. But it wouldn't have occurred to him, then, that there was any danger in it. He turned to the XP, a well-built young man whose chin rose in challenge. "What about you? Any engineering experience?"

Jack looked to Mitchell first. Bravado beat out whatever he saw there. "A bit, yeah. I get out with the guys...picked up a few tricks, you know?"

Tate glanced around, looking in vain for Leon. One of the new arrivals was another technician. He'd read his personnel file only that morning, while discussing duty assignments. As luck would have it— _serendipity_?—there was a group of newcomers, gathered by the fire pit. They tended to do that, at first—flocked together like birds. The open air was a shock to the system, after five years in space. Among their number was the man from the photo in that file.

"Take Grant Anderson with you." He pointed to the face in question. "You may need his input."

"Holt," Mitchell said, warning in his voice. But as much as Jack admired Mitchell, he did not enjoy being yanked back into place.

"I got this, Mitchell, yeah?" He looked to Tate. "I'll get my kit."

"Thank you," Tate said. Jack seemed surprised. It was not a sentiment he heard very often. He jogged off to find Grant Anderson. Mitchell spat on the sand and walked away, off to recapture his wife. He was replaced by Tipper Malone, glassy-eyed and slurring his words.

"Listen," he said, "Dick. Can I call you Dick? Dick Tate. Dic-tate. Shoulda put that on your posters..."

He slung an arm around Tate's shoulders. The fumes on his breath could have powered the entire city. "This music is _shite_. Let me get on the decks. Come on, man. I'm begging you. I wanna be a DJ."

"Go and sober up, Tipper." Tate disengaged his arm. "And I'll forget we had this conversation."

"Dick," Tipper said, swaying, and this time it was not Tate's name he was referring to.

There would be many sore heads in the morning, but Tate's was not among them. He woke at the standard hour, followed his routine. Workout, shower, a private breakfast, a briefing in his office with his department heads. There was little of note to discuss. The post-party clean-up had begun. The medicentre projected an urgent need for expansion, thanks to their increased population. PAS agreed to work with the XPs, to collect the cargo from CT5, scattered across the desert. The inventory included pharmaceuticals, dental floss, and clothing. And for some unexplained reason, twenty tonnes of paper.

The beacon had been repaired. Holt and Anderson had done a fine job: they'd received a pulse from Earth overnight.

Three months later, they stopped coming altogether. But that's a different story.

Tate had started dining at the canteen. Stella thought it was good for morale, for him not to hide away. He suspected she'd put guards on him: tit for tat. He began to see Jack there too, with Anderson. They seemed to have forged a friendship. Tate privately felt it would be good for the XPs, to develop more relationships outside of their own circle. They had chips on their shoulders, even then, about their assignments. There was a 'them and us' mentality developing, an attitude that came from the very top.

The XPs were never intended to be soldiers. They are no mere grunts; well, most of them. But certainly, some have that background. All have served that function, more often than not. Their grievances did have some merit. Their reputation for being more brawn than brains is not without cause, either...pains him as it does to say so.

One lunchtime, a group of them came swaggering in, hollering and jostling. They ignored Tate, and everyone else, and made a beeline for Jack.

"Aye aye," one said. "This looks cosy."

"This your new boyfriend Holty?" said another.

Tate didn't know, at that point, that Anderson was gay. It was of no consequence. But it seemed common knowledge to everyone else, and it made a difference to the nature of the banter. Anderson shrugged it off, bantered right back, clearly comfortable in his own skin. Jack's smile only tightened, with every ill-judged joke.

"Heard youse two left the party early, the other week," an XP said, waggling his eyebrows.

Anderson looked proud as punch, of his first assignment. "We went to fix the beacon."

"Is that what they're calling it on Earth these days?.."

They made juvenile kissing noises. Anderson laughed. But something in Jack had snapped. He thumped the table, making everyone jump. "Cut it out, boys, yeah?"

The room went silent. The XPs started sniggering. Jack stiffened, one fist clenched. There were armed PAS officers at the table beside him. He was volatile, a loaded gun in his own right. But he was smart enough, that time, not to fire it.

"See you round," he said to Anderson, and stalked away, chest-thumping laughter following him.

Was it just that Jack couldn't take a joke? Perhaps that played a part: he's more sensitive than he seems. He was younger then, with thinner skin, rising through the ranks. But he's always been ambitious. Had an ego, like Mitchell. The faintest whiff of judgement and his defences go straight up. The mere suggestion that _he_ is a grunt, and nothing but, raises his hackles. You flatter him easily—and underestimate him at your peril.

As you discovered, Julius...if you'll recall.

Jack was arrested five times in the next fortnight for breaking perimeter rules. Out after dark with a succession of women from CT5, like the teenager he no longer was. Mitchell thought PAS were making an example of his squad. Stella told Cass to stop rising to the bait. Tate feared something deeper was going on.

When he next walked into the canteen, he saw Jack there again, sitting with Fleur. He was blatantly leering, his manner flirtatious. Fleur could give as good as she got, but Tate found it uncomfortable, given Jack's recent behaviour. He feared she'd get hurt, if she fell for his charms. He took his tray and went over.

"May I join you?" he asked. Fleur stood up immediately. Jack, unable to hide his disappointment, followed suit. "No, no. Sit, please. Pretend I'm not here."

"Vegetable ravioli..?" Fleur beamed at her own, empty plate. "It's really good, isn't it?"

"What I'd give for a thick, juicy hamburger..." Jack smirked at Fleur. "Nice couple of buns."

She leaned over, looking innocent. "Well we've plenty of thick."

He chuckled to himself. Fleur rolled her eyes.

Tate speared his pasta, metal singing on metal. "I hear Grant Anderson is doing excellent work in infrastructure." Laughter drained from Jack's face. He added, "Leon speaks very highly of him."

"He's a lovely guy," Fleur agreed. Though never shy to offer a differing take, she respected his office like no one else. She looked to Jack, prompting an opinion.

"Wouldn't know. We don't hang out no more. Got nothing in common."

"I thought you two had made friends?" Fleur tutted. "Guess it's true then...that XPs don't have any."

"What's this, Cromwell running his mouth again?"

"He talks more sense than you," she said.

"CT5 is going to prove a great asset to Forthaven," Tate continued, ignoring the bickering. "We've been joined by some very special talents."

Jack's glare became a grin. "Hell yeah... How'd they squeeze that many fit birds on one transporter?"

"Mr Holt," Tate said. "Why don't you join me in my office later?"

In his speech to their new arrivals, he'd spoken of how things were better on Carpathia. Not perfect—but better. Even through his grief, he'd believed that. And yet. Tipper had dropped out of school. A man was being teased about his sexuality, under the guise of humour. Cracks were appearing, and people were falling through.

"Are you happy in Forthaven, Jack?" he asked, from behind his desk, when the door had shut.

Jack shifted in his chair, restless. He was a man in perpetual motion, a blunt instrument. He wasn't used to niceties, any more than thank yous.

"Sometimes," he said, eventually.

The thought he put into it gave Tate pause. He strutted around like a mini-Mitchell, might one day be heir to his throne. He'd need him on side, should that day ever come. Yet the care with which he chose his words suggested there was a different side to him, behind that hard veneer. It was data he hadn't expected to gather.

"Your file says you arrived alone. Did you leave anyone behind?"

"Yeah." He twisted the ring on his middle finger. "My mum."

"Is there a chance she might join you?"

"She couldn't afford it. Her church sponsored my place." He shrugged, but Tate saw the effort it cost him. "She wanted a different sort of life for me. Whatever it took, she said."

"I ask for regular appraisals from all departments." It wasn't a lie, exactly. Mitchell rarely bothered. "You're doing well here. You've made a solid start to your career with the expeditionaries. Your mother would be proud."

"What, 'cos I've got a job and I'm not in jail?" The defensiveness told its own story. As Tate digested it, Jack's face softened. "I still think I can hear her voice in my head, you know? Do this, do that... Eat your greens. Stop that cussin'."

He sat up straighter, alarmed at the moment of weakness. "What's this really about, then? We got therapists for deep and meaningfuls." He eyed Tate with suspicion. "You want me to snitch on someone, is that it?"

"It's interesting," Tate said, "that you'd jump to that conclusion. As it happens, there have been some allegations of bullying, within the XPs." He picked a file at random, as if it contained that very thing. He folded his hands upon it. "You know where I am, if that's ever a subject you can shed some light on."

Jack's sullen silence said that the heat death of the universe would occur, long before that ever did.

"Forthaven isn't perfect, Jack. It's getting better. But to keep it that way, _we_ need to be better. Live up to our own potential. Be kinder, to ourselves, and each other. Do you understand?"

"I think so," he said, sounding sceptical.

"This is a new start for all of us. Follow your own voice. Not your mother's. Not mine. Not even Mitchell's. Be the man that _you_ want to be."

Jack stared at him. "Can I go now?"

As Tate opened his mouth, a crackle of static burst from the speakers. Feedback screamed. Tate covered his ears; Jack shot up, a coiled spring. There was a cushioned thud. Another. And then—

"Good evening Forthaven!" sang Tipper's chipper voice. There was a rebellious smile in it. "And a big, warm welcome to this inaugural broadcast of Radio Free Carpathia..."

Tate sighed. He might even have put his head in his hands. When he looked up, Jack was gone, door swinging in his wake. Tate had given his pep talk. He didn't follow—but the jokes did. To this day, they dog him. You've clearly heard them, Julius. No doubt used them to your advantage.

Jack rises above it now, feels less need to compensate. He retrieved Grant Anderson's body, sat in the front row at his funeral. Whether there was ever truth to the rumours, or it was simply teasing, is not the point. Tate finds it a failing, that it made Jack uncomfortable enough to doubt his own judgement. He changed who he was, for fear of losing the family he'd forged. Cast aside a friend, to win favour with those who never were.

He has never believed humanity to be fundamentally flawed. They've stamped out hunger and poverty. Exchanged religious divides for secular peace. Left bigotry behind on Earth, where it belongs.

But the milk of human kindness...that, he sometimes fears, has curdled: beyond salvation.


	3. Chapter 3

"It's fitting," Berger says, "that you left a chessboard in your quarters. You have a quite disturbing penchant for playing with people's lives. You position your pawns, right where they're most useful."

Tate runs a hand through his beard, rather than dignify it with an answer. The heat has become oppressive; he feels sweat beading down his collar. He can only imagine how dishevelled he must look. Even Berger has lost his crispness. There are purple slugs, feasting beneath his eyes. His hair is flying wild, closer to a bird's nest than a comb.

Today's shirt is navy, sleeves buttoned fast to the wrists. It would match his eyes—were they not bloodshot.

Berger waves a hand, pleased with the gambit. "Ask your questions. You've earned them."

"You winced, then: when you moved your arm. Is it sore?"

"Your concern for my health is heartwarming. If you must know, we're trialling a vaccine to protect us, should the ACs return from whichever hellhole they've vanished into. As a responsible citizen, I'm playing my part."

"What really happened on the transporter, when you had your— _experience_? The encounter with a higher power, wasn't it..?"

"Are you _mocking_ me, Richard? Now?" But he cuts off Tate's denial. Everyone likes talking about themselves: power-crazed narcissists most especially.

"I was at a viewport. There was a grid overlaid on it, showing the location of Carpathia, how far we still had to go. I peered into the void, searching for Earth. I saw nothing, of course. Nothing but my own emptiness.

"I'd spent years shepherding others to a fresh new start. But it had never occurred to me before: how hard it would be, to leave it all behind. My fellow passengers looked to me for guidance, but I withdrew from them. I was selfish. I mourned for what I'd lost...the vain trappings of status it had taken me a lifetime to accumulate."

"It's not easy," Tate says, "saying goodbye to the only home you've ever known. Even when it no longer really exists."

"That night I had a dream. An angel came to me, a being of purity and strength. It asked, 'are you going the right way?' I said yes, of course. I trusted Captain Kellerman. Our heading was clear. The angel said, ' _this_ is the right way'. And then it embraced me in its light. It showed me the spirit that connected us—that connects us all. I knew, then, what I had been sent to this world to do. Joy filled my heart. I woke, and began the work entrusted to me."

"Yet that spirit does not recognise the ACs?"

"Of course not." Berger has no difficulty, squaring opposing ideologies. His messianic narrative—his ruthless pursuit of power. They present no contradiction; he can always justify himself, where pushed.

"They're unnatural. A pestilence. Approving their use on this mission is a sin I can never atone for."

"You think it's a _sin_ , to fast-forward our own evolution? You'd never modify yourself, to whatever degree best ensured your survival?"

Berger's brow furrows, perceiving a trick. "There's only one man in this room who has a history of playing God."

"And only one man with a history of creating convenient targets for witch hunts."

"You wanted them dead too, Richard. Every bit as much as me."

"We are not the same, Julius. However much you persist in peddling that fiction."

That enigmatic smile is back on Berger's lips. "Hmm," is all he says.

"I didn't order their deaths for my own petty vengeance. I followed the science... I believed there was no other option. It gave me no pleasure. Quite the opposite."

"Did it never occur to you that your judgement was compromised, by the death of your children? That, in fact, it remains so?" He clasps his hands, spinning his web. "I wonder how your lovely wife felt about you committing genocide on their behalf..."

Whatever he sees on Tate's face brings a malicious gleam to his eyes. "Tell me this: did you decide to exterminate them after Melissa chose to end her life? Or was it before?"

"Implying I bear some responsibility for the loss of my wife is a stunning new low," Tate says, "even for a bottom feeder like you, Julius."

"Always so cool under pressure. Such a model politician. When in doubt, deflect. Don't think I haven't noticed, Richard: you haven't answered my question."

Time is white sand, running through an hourglass. Blood rushes in his ears. The red light flashes an urgent SOS. Dot-dot-dot. Dash-dash-dash. Dot-dot-dot. Tate blinks it back to the periphery. He sees what he wants to see: hasn't it always been that way? The light is not his friend. He has none of those left, either.

"I can't tell you how happy I am," Berger says, "that Tipper Malone's subversive little broadcasts are a thing of the past." He watches Tate, going cold before him, the walls closing in. But it's only an aside. The threat is what follows.

"He hasn't exactly endeared himself to our new friends. They're much less tolerant than you. It would be such a waste of a remarkable intellect...if he had no one to advocate for his usefulness..."

Paper rustles. It's real. Not real. Berger is not really here, he tells himself. It's another figment of his own, fevered imagination.

If only he still knew how to dream.

"Before."

Berger cocks an ear. "What was that, Richard? Please, speak up."

"Before," Tate repeats, his voice sounding hollow to his ears.

The light fritzes in the ceiling. Shadows stretch around them, plunging him to the darkest depths of his memories; of his very being.

"I ordered their deaths while Melissa was still alive. She knew everything. It would be understating it...to say that she did not agree."

"Well now." Berger reclines in his chair, making himself comfortable. "Now we're finally getting somewhere."

When he thinks of C23, he thinks of the numbers. The six months they'd spent on Carpathia, when it broke out. Twenty-two new viruses, identified during that time, most of them minor colds. Five years: the length of patient zero's life. The four days it took her to die.

Three in the morning, when Charlie padded into their room and crawled into their bed, a halo setting fire to his head. He was seven years old. Joe was eight, going on eighteen.

How to describe how it felt, to watch scores of children growing sicker and sicker, their own organs devouring themselves, every treatment ineffective? How to adequately convey the horror of seeing them die, one after another, knowing your own would be next?

It was unspeakably cruel. It was the single worst time of his life.

He attended seventeen funerals in a single day. Twenty-one the next. The numbers kept on rising. Melissa was angry with him, for leaving the boys' bedsides. Tate had seen the virus ravage its victims; he knew there was little hope. It would be inaccurate to say he accepted it, but what good did it do, to rage at cold, hard facts? He'd brought two innocent boys—babies, when they'd left Earth—to a place he'd thought they could bloom. Instead, he'd condemned them to their grave.

Did he blame himself, you ask? There was no future for his boys, on a dying planet. In the short time they had, they slept among stars, built shining white sandcastles, felt the sun warm their faces. He was grateful, to at least have given them that.

He attended a session of general council, the morning Charlie died. Birds were tweeting merrily, as he walked there. Dr Desta was already mid-lecture, describing the medics' latest findings. Stella's face fell, at what she saw in his. She reached for his hand, as he walked past her.

"We're still trying to understand the mechanism by which it spreads," Desta was saying. "Schools and public places are shut, but children are still getting sick. Their families must also have been exposed. Yet none of them have fallen ill, or even tested positive—"

"Then we can relax the quarantine?" Aduba asked. Julius would not remember him; he was, at that time, the council member for justice.

There was no justice in this.

"There's a chance we'll need to expand it." Murmurs grew around the table. "We believed the correlation between the victims was their age. But we've had three patients admitted this week with similar symptoms: all of them adults. No halo, but the same spiking temperature, raging thirst... They're in isolation while we await the test results. We have to consider the possibility that it's C23."

"If the rest of us get it," Mitchell said, "it's going to wipe out the entire city." He didn't look scared. He never was. He fed on the monsters under the bed, the terrors others shied away from.

The noise level grew as the muttering increased. People were talking among themselves, gesturing wildly. Someone said, in a loud voice, "Could it be an _alien_ virus?"

Tate slammed a hand on the table. The sound was sucked from the room, as if he'd opened an airlock.

"Let the doctor speak," he said, into the vacuum. Desta smiled at him, grateful. There was pity in her eyes. He hung his head, unable to bear it.

"We've traced their movements; none of them came into contact with the children. I'd like to begin more widespread testing. We have to find out how many asymptomatic carriers there are, among the population."

"See to it," Tate ordered. He turned to Mitchell. "Determine the best sector to designate as a quarantine zone. We need to keep the rest of the city moving, where we can."

Mitchell nodded. "Try not to scare anyone," Tate said, as he stood up. He scowled; a welcome flare of normality. Tate looked around, at each face in turn. "That goes for all of you. Feed this message down to your people: it's too early to jump to conclusions, much less apocalyptic ones. We've suffered incalculable losses, and panic will not honour them. What we need is data."

But what a colony needed was children. They were dying too easily, too fast, and it would take nine months to replace them. Charlie and Joe were not replaceable—never, ever—but harsh reality left no room for sentiment. He had no more Omega patterns, limited tech, but he could grow extra ACs, if he had to. If the adults started dying too, if the transporters didn't come, if they didn't make it through the atmosphere—

If, if, _if_.

Starting over meant nothing if the human race was extinguished. They'd replicated Earth as closely as they could, within this low-tech aridity. They had no satellites, no internet, no mobile phones. No culture but that they'd remembered to bring. Still they woke in the morning, went to work, wound down with a beer at night. They married who they liked, had children when and if they wanted. If the mortality rate rose sufficiently, that freedom would no longer be an option. Everything they did would have to be consciously geared towards perpetuating themselves.

How decadent they'd been. An endangered species, imagining they'd always have choices.

No wonder Viner had bolted, the first chance he got.

He arrived at the AC sector with all manner of apocalyptic scenarios playing out in his head. Officially, it was under construction. They were kept segregated, only a select few granted access. Tate still had tests to conduct. He hadn't yet decided whether to insert them into the populace. Tigger 103 had not exactly been a roaring success.

He wasn't much good at cleaning, either.

The chain link fence rattled as he walked past. The birds that had been roosting there took to the skies in fright, leathery wings flapping. He turned to see Rudi, fingertips gripping the borders of his world.

"Tate," he said. "Elijah is sick."

Tate had always found it interesting: how often this one spoke for the rest. He hadn't been made that way, at least not on purpose. If he possessed leadership qualities, it was the things he'd been exposed to, in his brief existence, that had brought them out. He was struck by the parallel. He'd made a note to study it, when he found time.

This was not it. Rudi's words brought him up short. "Does he have a fever?" he asked. "A light above his head?"

"He lashed out again. He's stopped moving, but his eyes are wide open."

"He's catatonic?"

The ACs absorbed knowledge like a sponge. "Catatonic. Yes." The confusion on his face evolved into suspicion. "What did you mean, a light above his head?"

"It was just a question, Rudi." He made to continue on his way. Rudi smacked the fence with a growl. Tate turned back. "Do you remember what we talked about? About patience?"

"Yes," he said, contrite. "The threat is stronger than the execution."

"In life, as it is in chess. I'll come and check Elijah shortly. I'm going to be checking you all. I need to take some swabs. A sample of your blood."

"It hurt," Rudi said, "the last time."

He sounded like a child. Tate was reminded of Joe, who was scared of needles, trying to be brave for Charlie, as the medics drew their blood. He swallowed back the tears that threatened. There would be time to mourn once the crisis was over, and Forthaven was saved.

"I'll be gentle, I promise. Tell the others for me. It's nothing to be worried about. I'm trying to keep you safe... You know I would never hurt you."

Even with their scientists working full tilt, the tests took a week to complete. The results took thirty-six hours. The three other patients had C14, a nasty flu. Every member of the council, every XP, every PAS officer—every single member of their society—tested negative for C23. The ACs tested positive. Every last one of them, except for Fleur. And still the children kept on getting sick. Still they kept on dying.

"If it carries on," Tate said to Melissa, curled against him in their too-quiet front room, "there will be no children left."

She lifted her head. Maybe she wasn't ready to hear it. But he needed her counsel. Then, more than ever.

"Who will bring a child into this world, knowing the fate that awaits it? We won't be living. We'll be awaiting our own extinction."

"Are the ACs showing any symptoms?" she asked.

Tate shook his head. He already knew what he had to do. He could have driven them away, left them to fend for themselves. But they were helpless, their every need taken care of. This corner of Carpathia was mostly radioactive scrubland. It would be a slow, painful demise. It was his moral obligation, to lessen their suffering.

"They're carriers? But that makes no sense. They don't have anything to do with the rest of us—they've never left their sector—"

"We don't know how it spreads. But the results were conclusive."

"If they're immune," Melissa said, "then _they_ could still have children."

He recoiled, at the thought of the ACs being left to carry on the human race. "Impossible. The men were modified to be sterile. And to use the women that way— The offspring might prove just as vulnerable. They're not breeding stock, Mel..." He stared into the distance. The boys' cup was sitting on the table before them. Neither of them could bear to move it.

"They're dangerous," he concluded.

Melissa watched his face. She knew him too well. She knew exactly what he was thinking.

"They're children too."

"They're an experiment," Tate said, more harshly than he intended. "Don't anthropomorphise them. Not now."

"They're working on a vaccine, you said. Developing new antivirals. We could beat this without hurting anyone else."

"There are no guarantees of that." He shifted up, took her hand. She'd followed him across the galaxy. He needed her to follow him now. "I have to. You know I have to."

"You said we came to this world to be better. To get away from the fighting and the killing. All that death...how is this any different, Richard? Tell me how this is any different."

"It's a hard decision...but it's also right."

He'd never seen her look at him, the way she did then. She snatched her hand away, as if he, too, were contagious. "Is that how the men who fired the nuclear missiles justified it, too?"

"They were following orders."

"And someone will have to follow yours. At least think of them, Richard."

"We could try again," he said. Oh, how foolish he was. To dangle that before her; imagine it in any way a comfort. "We could have another baby."

She slapped him, then. He deserved it. Welcomed it, even. Tears filled his eyes from the shock of it, the ones he kept locked away inside, had never let himself cry. Melissa trembled with fury before him, and then she was crying, too.

"I don't want another one," she said, brokenly. "I just want my boys back."

It's a common enough tale, for bereaved parents. They should have been grieving together, but a divide opened up between them. Melissa shrugged off every effort Tate made to bridge it, brushed off his touch. He wanted to heal her pain, to _fix_ it—but there are things that cannot be fixed. Facts that cannot be changed. She thought him a murderer, and he was. The evacuation programme had been his baby, not hers. He'd convinced her to come, spun tall tales about the life that awaited them. He was the death of her hopes, of her dreams.

Of his own life's work.

He told the council that the ACs needed to go. People were disinclined to argue, when you'd lost both your children; the vote was carried, without debate. A small voice inside him, one that sounded like Melissa, said he should be the one to do it. Tate knew his limitations. He ignored it and ordered it done, as quickly as possible.

Mitchell agreed to deal with it. He didn't give specifics, but the inference was clear. He asked for a day to make arrangements, and Tate made use of the time to clear out his lab. The sector would be deep-cleaned, and then repurposed. They'd need the space, once other transporters arrived.

He was angry with Melissa, for not supporting him. In his grief, he thought her self-centred. Didn't she see it was difficult for him, too? He was angry with the world: the one his boys had been born to, the one where they'd died. When he realised there were tools missing from his lab, his rage hit boiling point.

He had Rudi brought to a holding cell. It was a carbon copy of this one, except the glass hadn't been blocked up. It had never been used; the ACs were mostly well-behaved. Tate sat where you are now, Julius. As Rudi waited before him, he emptied out a toolbox. The missing items bounced onto the table: a scalpel, a pair of tongs, a syringe. A microscope slide, snapped in two. There was also one, incongruous pencil, absent its point.

"We found these under your bunk," he said. "What were you planning on doing with them?"

It shouldn't have mattered. The ACs would be marched outside and killed in a few short hours. Why did he care, that one of them had stolen things? Julius is right, as a stopped clock sometimes is: his judgement was compromised, when it came to that. It spoke poorly of him, and grief was no excuse. He toyed with someone he had power over, a man already condemned, because he'd realised how little power he actually had. He played the one game he thought he could win.

"Were you planning to hurt someone? Your guards, perhaps? One of the doctors? _Me_?"

He tapped a shard of slide on the table. It caught the sunlight, fiery in its death throes. Rudi stayed stoically silent.

"Or was it escape? Did you feel like going for a stroll? Off to see a bit of the world? Well, now's your chance. Look around. What a wonderful world it is."

His finger stung. He held it up, realised he'd cut it on the glass. A fat drop of red oozed from the slit. The same thing ran through the veins of the man in front of him, except he was not a man. He was a thing, the thing that had killed his boys, and Tate was one of the few to know he existed. For all he knew, it was _he_ who'd brought the virus to the rest of Forthaven; to his home; to his children.

An anguished noise escaped him, like a cornered animal. Rudi looked startled.

"Richard," he said, "are you all right?"

"Oh, what's this—concern?"

"Of course," Rudi said. "You're my friend."

"My friends are human beings. You are not a human being."

He was not so hardened, back then; had not yet experienced the sting of betrayal. Hurt flickered on his face. It was a fact, but it was cruel. It was like kicking a puppy.

"Did I programme you to steal?" Tate asked. "No. No, I did not. So why did you? Tell me. I'm interested. I want to know. Help me understand you."

"Will you punish me?"

"Traditionally," Tate said, "an individual declared guilty of theft would have their hands cut off."

You don't have to physically hurt a man to punish him. Words have that power, too. He didn't expect Rudi to answer, after that—but he did.

"Because I wanted something that was my own." His face was implacable. The scales were falling. "You give us nothing."

"You're clothed. Fed and watered. What more do you want? What on earth could you possibly want with a broken pencil—"

And then he understood. He started to laugh. Rudi didn't enjoy being made fun of. His mouth set in a hard, tight line.

"Of course. I should have known. Which one of them are you protecting? Elijah? He likes to draw, in his sessions—"

"It was me," Rudi roared, which told Tate very well that it wasn't.

He looked at him, again perceiving that surprising kinship. Perhaps they truly could have been friends, one day, in as far as it was possible with those you'd helped create. For Fleur he felt tenderness, affection. With Rudi it was satisfaction, the beginnings of respect. There was only one other man in Forthaven who shared his fierce need to protect his people, to do whatever it took...and it was an AC.

For all the bad blood between them, Tate trusts him, to take care of them. To make sure Fleur is safe. He's glad that Julius hasn't found them. He hopes, with every fibre of his being, that he never does.

He placed the items back in the toolbox, one by one. "I would let you keep them," he said, "but I'm afraid none of you will be here for much longer."

"Where are we going?" Rudi asked, with such painful naivety.

He was much more trusting, in those days.

Tate didn't answer. "Let me tell you a story," he said instead, "about the science that created you. It's always been viewed with suspicion. It's long been seen as meddling with the natural order, even by those who are not religious. Many years ago, they believed genetically modified food, the kind we now take for granted, was a risk to health. Even when the weight of evidence did not support it. Only when that science produced more tangible benefits—like engineered insulin—did the tide of opinion begin to turn. And still, some were not mollified. They thought it was too risky. Too poorly understood. That there would one day be terrible consequences, for our hubris."

He snapped shut the toolbox. "A group of XPs will be coming for you soon. Tell the others. Make sure they co-operate."

There was a reason he played chess, and not poker. He was viciously glad of it, on that dark day.

Rudi stared at him with dawning horror. "You wouldn't," he said.

"Wouldn't what?"

"You said... You said you'd never hurt us."

"And I won't," Tate said, twisting the knife with semantics, as he got up to go.

Would he have sacrificed Fleur as well, to ensure the future of their race?

No. Yes. Maybe.

It's the one piece of luck he was granted...that he never had to find out.

He met Mitchell at the fence the next morning, as dawn rose over Forthaven. The other XPs had arrived back hours before. He trudged alone through the hills, a smear on the horizon, covered in sweat and grime. There were bloodstains on his vest. He had a shovel in his pack, gun slung across his shoulder. Tate had no inkling that he'd disobeyed. He knew, after Viner, what he was capable of. How unlikely he was to lose any sleep over it.

"Did they struggle?" he asked, like he had before.

"Yes," Mitchell said, this time.

Words, and their power to punish. He should have known. Right then: he should have known.

It was quite by chance, that they isolated C23 in a species of bird. It had tough dark wings that made a distinctive sound, resembled the blackbird of Earth. They called it a nightbird, to differentiate. It was a friendly sort. Nightbirds roosted on the fences around the AC sector; gathered in the schoolyard, hoping for food. How the children had giggled, when they landed in their hair. The ACs liked to pet them.

What—did you think they caught and killed them? They were not designed for violence. It was Tate's actions, Mitchell's stories, that made them that way.

C23 stopped, eventually. The birds migrated, and never came back. Or so the story went. The loss of life was horrendous, but the ACs were not the cause. The birds were not the cause, either, though at the time, they were—do stop interrupting, Julius. It's impolite.

Don't worry. He'll get around to that.

He'd got it wrong. It was an awful, tragic mistake, but he found it was one he could live with. For all Mitchell's posturing about hard decisions, it was Tate who was able to make them, and he took a certain pride in that. Stella was his defacto deputy, had been his campaign manager, and she tracked public opinion. People didn't know what he'd done to save the city, but his stock had risen anyway. They trusted him to do what was right. To look after them, as the ACs once had.

Interrogating Rudi had not been his finest hour, but he kept the shame of it to himself. His record-keeping was normally meticulous, but that he omitted. It was as dark a moment in his personal history as the massacre had been in the settlement's.

It said things about him that he would much have preferred to forget.

One night, he dreamed of the cell. How shiny the walls had been. How they'd reflected his own failings back at him. It was a locked box inside of him, stuffed full of secrets. The dream woke him up. He reached for Melissa. She was not beside him.

People say they know, when something is wrong. Tate had never believed in such things, before that night. Logic told him that she'd gone to get a drink, or taken a walk, neither of which were now uncommon. His every nerve said different. He paced his rooms and finally called Stella, half-expecting her to laugh, accuse him of rousing her from her bed to partake in a wild goose chase. But she took him seriously. It worried him even more.

"We'll find her," she said. "Sit tight. I'll be in touch as soon as I can."

Tate could not sit still, with his wife missing. He joined in the search, offered fruitless suggestions. Melissa was not at Can 91, her office, or the memorial garden that was taking shape, where the ashes had been scattered. Containers were prised open, storage lockers checked. The fence was closed. Temperatures could drop precipitously, at nights.

She wouldn't have gone outside.

She couldn't have done.

"Unless she used the tunnel," Cass said, and there it was again. That creeping dread, defying every rational thought.

They'd taken the boys for a picnic, on Tate's last birthday. They'd played football in the sand, hide and seek in the rocks. It had been a perfect day. Tate believed that days like that, though very different in shape, could still lie ahead. Even the idea of moving on was unthinkable, to Melissa. It was the fundamental difference between them.

She looked peaceful, when they found her, like she was asleep. The lines were smoothed from her face. He let himself imagine there was a smile on her lips. He tucked his jacket around her, kissed her cold skin, and walked back to Forthaven. He went to seven briefings, that week, chaired three meetings. He attended two weddings, and only one funeral. His approval rating rose a further twelve points. He kept on swimming; he had no intention of drowning.

So few stories have a happy ending. It's where Melissa's chapter closes.

But his is not over.

Not

quite

yet.


	4. Chapter 4

He finds he can't bear the light, anymore. He hides his head when it flickers on, heralding Berger's arrival; scuttles to the corners like a frightened mouse. He lets himself be led, unprotesting, to his seat. He sits there, a fracturing bag of bones, while his eyes adjust.

He's a man diminished: muscles weakened, sanity frayed. He mutters to himself during everlasting nights, cloned hours of tarry sameness. Disruptive influence he may be—but no one would consider him a threat.

Berger is right at home in the shadows, as much as he seeks the limelight. But his blasé calm has, increasingly, begun to stutter. When Tate drums his fingers on the table, the crease on his brow becomes a chasm. He rubs his temples, slippery with sweat, as if he's got a headache. _Tap-tap-tap. Pat-pat-pat. Tap-tap-tap_ : the sound is an ice pick, chipping at his composure. He closes his eyes for a second, a visible effort to centre himself.

"I've been unable to locate Captain Viner's wife," he says, mask repaired. "What happened to her?"

"Dolores? She became a teacher. She married Dennis Aduba. They were very happy together... Both perished in a whiteout, four years ago."

"How convenient."

"I prefer _tragic_."

"Did she know you participated in the state-sanctioned murder of her husband?"

"Did I?" Tate asks, vaguely. "I don't recall telling you which way I voted."

Berger can't conceal his frustration. He picks flecks of sand from his ink-black shirt, eyes flashing like a cat in the dusk, the rest of him melding with it. He fires questions like bullets, as if Tate is not the only one who's running out of time.

  


_When were you planning on holding another election?_

_Did you fix the last one?_

_Were you grooming the AC Fleur Morgan as your successor?_

_How did you convince Jack Holt to tell wild stories about a duplicate Josie Hunter?_

_Has Stella Isen ever taken a lover?_

_Did you wish it was you?_

  


And then the one he really wants to know, the needle in his hide that's been consuming him since it first landed. "If you're telling the truth, and the ACs didn't cause the virus—then what did?"

"A question you never stopped to consider, while you were blinkered by hatred. Busy with your latter-day crusade."

"Was it you? Another of your projects, gone wrong?"

He greets that with a humourless smile. "The ultrasonic shield was Stella's innovation. If you want to know so badly, then why haven't you asked her?"

"I'm asking _you_. That's the point of this exercise, Richard: you tell me all the things that I don't know, and in so doing, help me understand you, and your favoured minions...this shabby excuse for a city. You prolong your life by making polite conversation. Why is that so hard for you? Are you so eager to join Melissa and your children..?"

"Every time I think you can't possibly burrow any lower, Julius, you manage to prove me wrong." Worry for Stella wars with that tiny ray of hope, his Olympic torch, ever burning inside him. He folds his arms, defiant. "How's Lily?"

Berger is feeling magnanimous. He goes along with it. "Recovered. Whining at length about her new accommodations. The youth of today...such a disappointment."

He lowers his voice, eyes shifting, like Tate is his co-conspirator and not his plaything. "You know, there are times I wonder if she truly is the real Lily Isen... Relations are still... _difficult_...with Stella. Shouldn't a mother feel more of a connection to her child? I didn't get to know her, on the transporter. I ask myself: is it possible she's a cuckoo in the nest? Of course, you'd need the services of a geneticist to be sure..."

"Reality can bear little resemblance to our hopes and dreams." Tate adds, after a pause, "And family is not determined solely by our DNA."

"Did you test her?" Berger grins across the table, delighted. "You did, didn't you? You couldn't help yourself. You and your trust issues, Richard. You just had to _know_."

"I might levy that same charge at you. I assume it was your friends on CT10 who told you about Fleur. That you were the one who left the note for Cass."

"Actually, I tasked one of my flock with that." He shrugs, successfully diverted. "But the result was the same. He proved himself unworthy. He showed his true colours." He clicks his tongue. "Much like his mentor."

"You could have been a part of _our_ family, here in Forthaven. Shared in what we've built together, instead of dripping poison. You cloak your religion in nebulous terms, to avoid division—yet all you've done is stoke it. We gave you a second chance, but you couldn't give us even one. You knew all along they were coming. This was always your endgame."

"I wanted to support you, Richard. I gave you _every_ chance to change your ways. Far more than you deserved."

"Lies. It's your way or the high way, Julius. It always has been."

"Pot, kettle...you saw me as a threat. Your belief in redemption is a religion all its own. Yet you threw my every overture straight back in my face."

"On the contrary: we made things easy for you. Too easy. You've been playing the long game, all this time. Well... That makes two of us."

Berger tilts his head, half-wary, half-amused. "Slightly overdoing the chess metaphors, aren't we?" He strokes his chin. "Did you ever consider calling yourself king, instead of president..?"

"Do you want my last confession, or don't you?"

" _Last_? Oh, Richard the first. I think that's for me to decide."

"Not anymore. Take it or leave it. This is the last thing I'm ever going to share with you, Julius. I suggest you pay attention."

"Are you ready to admit to your sins, instead of duplicitously skirting around them?"

"Original sin? Sin of omission? I'm particular about definitions. Be more specific." He raps out a rhythm on the table. " _Confessor_ , for instance. It means to hear a confession. Also to be the one confessing. Which is it? Is it you, or is it me? Can you tell the difference?"

Berger stares at him, plainly believing him unhinged.

"Oh don't worry," Tate says, to save him tying himself in knots. He grins back at him: his confessor. His captive audience.

"I saved the best one...right for the end."

  


  


  


He sees things, sometimes. Is that juicy enough for you, Julius? He sees his children, healthy and whole, years after they died.

He sees himself: precisely as he is.

He's not a man given to self-delusion. He is not dreaming—ha! It is not a physical ailment, or a mental one. He has not lost his mind, though he will certainly give you credit: you've pushed him perilously close to his limits. Would you believe that he actually looks forward to your visits? He knows, now, what it's really like to be alone. It's not an experience he wishes to repeat. He will think differently about isolating himself, in future.

He will tell Cass Cromwell what a pleasure it's been, to see him grow; that he never needed DNA, to consider him a son.

He will ask Stella Isen to dance.

Nor is he seeing ghosts. There's no such thing. He is not haunted by his past, or the things he got wrong. Oh, there are regrets, but this is where they led him. There's no eventuality in which he can't justify his actions, even to himself. He shares that with you. He can order the ACs to their deaths, and flatter himself a good leader; a good man. He can treat them like cattle with opposable thumbs, and love Fleur enough to save her, and never once consider himself a hypocrite.

Things can be the same, and they can be different. You understand that duality, better than anyone.

They’re both so good at lying. In another life, he thinks they, too, might have been friends.

  


Stella sees things, too: she uses DBV on herself, sometimes. He worries she'll get addicted. He's pulled her back from the brink, once before. Another juicy secret for you. He'll tell you about it some time—oh wait. He won't. So now you'll never know...unless Stella decides to share.

Tate has never used DBV, not once. He has no moral objection to it, unless it's being misused. He doesn't need to relive his memories. They exist as part of him, the way Melissa and his boys do, because they made him who he is.

Did you never consider using it here? It would have been an easier way to extract information. But you believe, don't you, that a mind should remain one's own? You hold that to be sacred, and not only because you have so much to hide. It's an interesting discovery: that it's one of the few things you espouse that you truly do agree with.

He believes in looking forward, always. So hard to tell what Julius Berger really believes in...other than himself.

  


Let's go back to this: the life in which they met. The project was in its infancy, then, but Tate was already on the committee. You were a late arrival that time, too: a failed politician whose run for governor was curtailed by whispers of financial irregularities. No mud ever stuck to you; your charm even innoculated you from allegations of corruption. You used your short time at NASA to inveigle your way into the programme. You said you felt you could do more good there. Even before you adopted the piety, you knew how to play people.

It was believed the programme would benefit from having an American in a position of power: the heft of their dollars, the weight of their history, still had influence, even while war was raging. Tate felt it would be disastrous to be seen taking sides. He thought the vast salary you'd negotiated could have been spent on more important things. The office you had redecorated, at huge expense, was not one of them.

Scientists rarely get on with the bureaucrats pulling the purse strings. His objection was not personal...until later.

You approved use of the ACs, but slashed funding to Tate's department by 25%. You contracted out the building of the transporters to a company you'd once sat on the board of, heedless of the conflict of interest. You cut corners, wherever you could. The galas promoting the programme, the differing levels of passage, were your brainchild. You turned mankind's last hope into a cruise ship; a noble endeavour into a circus.

You remember Jessie Wu, don't you? Oh don't play the innocent: Tate's research assistant. You took quite a shine to her. When she turned down your advances, you made it your mission to destroy her. You produced evidence that she'd been spying for her government, and the bombing of Chicago played right into your hands. You said that your efforts to unite the globe around the project had been premature. With regret, you said, a quiver in your voice, citizens from certain nations would no longer be permitted on board the transporters.

What's that: it was for the good of mankind that those who relished in destruction were excluded from the genepool? You dare use his own science against him? Yes, he selected certain people for the project, based on favourable genetic patterns, but it was never about eugenics. It was about survival. Whereas you—you took racism and spite, and made them an artform. You made them seem so reasonable that intelligent people, scared of getting left behind, flocked en masse to support you.

You did the same thing here. History repeats itself, Julius, unless we're careful.

But some of us remember.

Some of us can never forget.

Tate had your measure, right from the start. So did Stella. It was loathing of you that laid the grounds for their friendship. She bought him a drink, at one of your galas. They bonded by swapping insults about you.

Perhaps she'll do her Julius Berger impression for you, one day. It's really very good.

Jessie didn't make it to Carpathia, because of your vendetta. There was a Chinese family who'd applied through the community outreach project, that Tate had set up. They didn't make it, either. But you weren't finished: since both nations were bombing the other back into the stone age, you put the kibosh on Americans, too. It served them right for not supporting you; who could possibly argue with such selfless neutrality?

It didn't stop you getting here, funnily enough...there's one rule for people like you, Julius, and another for those you so gleefully crush beneath you, when they get in your way.

Do you see _their_ faces, in the dark corners of your quarters?

Are you haunted by your past—the way a good man should be?

  


There's a life force, on Carpathia. It made his children and their belongings appear to him; speaks to him, in his own voice, with his own face. It made an imperfect copy of Josie Hunter. It created C23, and C24, and with what wit it selected its weapon. Viruses care for nothing, except their own survival. They are humanity's dark mirror, endlessly replicating themselves.

Forthaven is the host force's petri dish. It experiments on its citizens the way Tate once did, on his ACs. The weak are a meaningless triviality, to the powerful. They've found ways to fight back, but few grounds on which to beg it for mercy. It's seen, first-hand, how they treat other species.

How they treat each other.

  


When someone dies, your own brain seeks to protect you from them, the way your body would with a virus. Feelings go numb. Faces are fought off, become a dreamlike blur. Nine years later, he knows what Melissa looked like, but unless he looks at a photograph, he can't picture her face. He doesn't keep a photo on his desk, never has. They're too poor a consolation. Instead he keeps a drawing, that Charlie had made of their family. One final string, that he can't bring himself to cut.

You would recognise it, if you saw it...

Yes. _This_ drawing.

He found it in here, early in his confinement. He thought it was a ploy to torment him: in a fit of defiance he ripped it into tiny shreds. They were gone the next day, when they brought his food. The day after, the picture was back, once again whole. He didn't make the same mistake twice. He keeps it inside his shirt, where no one ever checks. They don't search him, anymore. The novelty has surely worn off.

Also, he hasn't had a shower in who knows how long, and smells like rotten meat.

It was a message, of sorts, but he had no idea what it meant. The host force was watching, that much was clear. The last time it had spoken to him was before the transporter landed. It had shown itself since, but he kept dismissing it, pushing it from his mind. Yet the picture was there, day after day after day. Finally, he summoned up the nerve to trust his own eyes. He lay in the dark, staring into the shadows, hoping to see it. It gave him something to focus on that wasn't the blink of the light; the wait for you to return.

He heard it, before he saw it. Melissa's voice, racing back to him, though he'd long since forgotten how it sounded.

"This is what you mean by love," it said.

His heart seized in his chest, but his voice was steady. "There are many different kinds. Human beings have an infinite capacity. We love our partners, our children, our friends..."

Melissa glided forward. She knelt before him, as if she were asking for forgiveness—or giving him hers. He knew what it was, but a sob caught in his throat. It was as much gift as torment, to see her again. Moving, breathing, _living_. He wanted to take her in his arms, so very badly. He wanted her to stay.

"Could you ever love us?" it wondered, with clinical curiosity.

"We do not love the things that hurt us."

" _This_ one hurt you."

"My wife died and I mourned her: of course it hurt. You conflate two things that are not the same..."

But they were—and he did not feel like lying.

He said, "Yes. Yes, I loved her. Yes, she hurt me. They're sides of the same coin. By loving someone, we give them power over us. We willingly submit to that, knowing how it might end. Love is also pain. Love is risk...but it's worth it."

It stared at him for a moment. "You remain interesting to us," it said, a lukewarm verdict.

"Well, I'm very glad to hear that."

He'd put aside his pride and begged Rudi for help. He'd been desperate enough to ask him to join forces against it, before it destroyed them. Something else you didn't know, Julius—are you keeping count? Tate doesn't understand the relationship between the ACs and the host force, though there seems to be one. It had cast an eye upon the ramshackle remains of humanity, and picked a side. He wondered if it might do it again: even if only to keep things _interesting_.

"Help us," he said. "They're killing us. They have no idea what they've begun. They'll kill us all. _You have to help us_ —"

He only realised at the end of the sentence that he was talking to thin air. He waited, ever hopeful. The lock did not click. The door did not open. The darkness remained all-consuming. It put its arms around him, red eye blinking, and swallowed him whole.

His last chance was gone. He was trapped in the belly of the beast, and in that moment, he realised that Berger had been right. That he'd been telling the truth, right from the start. He'd adapted, better than imagined. He'd thought him his rival—but he was the only ally he had left. What a world to inhabit: in which your bitterest enemy can become your greatest hope.

Flicker-flicker-flicker. Flash-flash-flash. Flash-flash-flash. Flash-flicker. What does it spell, what does it spell?

It's a ticking clock.

It's the pendulum swing of his own despair.

  


Different questions, same meaning: how long can he stand it? How long can he string it out?

Riddle him this: how long _is_ a piece of string?

  


He knows, at last, what's real. In these, his final hours, he has everything he could ever need.

He has his family. He has himself.

Close your eyes.

Bow your head.

Let us pray—

  


You said, once, that you lose nothing by having faith. That it brings you peace. Gives you hope: that when you slide into the darkness, there will be light at the end.

God said, let there be light.

Amen to that.

  


His preferred definition is this:

Let it be. 

  


  


  


For a moment, there is silence. Berger's mouth is hanging open. He levers it shut.

"Richard," he says, carefully, "I do believe you've lost your mind. I do know the drawing you mean. And it's not here. There's nothing in your hand..."

"You imagine yourself a puppet master. But you are not in control on Carpathia. They are."

"There is no such thing as a disembodied intelligence that _talks_ to you..."

"What else would you call your universal spirit?"

Berger's jaw works. "Faith," he says, finally. "I would call it faith."

"And you have faith in your friends, do you? Even after they cut down swathes of the people you've lived side by side with for months? People who have welcomed you, without agenda? Been nothing but kind?"

"I did warn you, Richard. The loss of life was...regrettable. But it served a purpose."

Tate's fingers twitch. Tick-tick-tick. Tock-tock-tock. "You have no idea of their purpose."

"And I suppose you do?"

"There are enough pieces for me to put it together."

"By all means," Berger says indulgently. "Enlighten me."

"The fingernail clippings. The blood test. The"—he makes finger quotes in the air—"'vaccine'. Your increasingly sickly appearance. This brave new world you hope to establish...your concerns about which of my people might be a worthy enough candidate for it.

"My quarters aren't grand enough for you, and you know nothing about chess: a long game actually refers to golf. I assume they've had you turn them upside down, looking for my research. With your lovely green eyes...which used to be blue."

Berger pales, ghost white in the gloom. It's a Pyrrhic victory. It's not as satisfying as he imagined, to finally render him speechless.

"Poor Julius. He hitched his cart to the wrong wagon. He thought they cared about grand, shiny skyscrapers, bigger and bolder cities: that they'd give him the keys to them. Finally give him the power and status he craved. Instead, they're trying to turn him into an AC."

Berger's hands go to his hair, to his face. He paws at his skin, an itch he's powerless to scratch.

"As it happens," Tate says, "your horror at the prospect is something we share. I imagine that surprises you, given my line of work. It's not a Damascene conversion: I believe in what we did, with the AC programme. I'm proud of it...I'm proud of Fleur. But I also believe in humanity. Small, weak, imperfect as we are: working every day to better ourselves. The two are not mutually exclusive."

" _Will you stop_ _drumming on_ _the damn table_ ," Berger snaps, rising to his feet, sending his chair skidding.

"I might be able to reverse the changes. There'd be some damage. You'd learn to live with it." He examines Berger thoughtfully. "I know who you are now, Julius. You've been a thorn in my side since the day we met, but I've never wished you harm, either. It's not too late. You can be better..."

Berger lets out a low moan. Words seem to have escaped him.

"I forgive you," Tate says, "for the things you've done."

"You," Berger spits, "forgive _me_?"

"We both want the same thing. We want our people to survive. We want mankind to go on, even if we disagree on how to achieve it. And now we have a common enemy...and it's not the ACs. It never was. We can fight against them—together. We can save Forthaven."

"The only thing Forthaven has ever needed saving from is _you_." He removes a handkerchief from his pocket, and pats at his forehead. The gesture appears to soothe him. "You were its first president—the first human being ever to be president of an entire planet, and you _squandered_ it. You will take the place in history you deserve. You will be nothing but a quiz question, one day... A man of giant ego and small ambition, who met an ignoble end."

"Not inaccurate," Tate considers, "since my present ambition stretches solely to escaping this cell."

Berger takes the bait. "And how are you planning on doing _that_?"

The red light turns off, and then on. Flash-flicker. Flash-flash-flash. Flicker-flash-flash.

  


_N-O-W_

  


Tate smiles at him, brighter than the sun. "Oh Julius the second," he says. "I thought you were never going to ask."

  


  


  


Three things happen, in quick succession: the thunderclap of the door, slamming open. Berger, starting out of his skin. Incandescent light, shattering the dark like a nuclear explosion. Tate had sufficient warning to cover his eyes, but he sees it, through his eyelids: the aftershock imprints in negative on his retinas.

Berger recovers from the flash grenade quickly. Too quickly. There's a moment when it looks like he might shout for help, but then he sees Cass, framed by the exit, an avenging angel. In one fraction of a heartbeat, something shifts in his stance. Tate sees it clearly, through his watering eyes: the story about another Julius, another Cassius, is rushing back to him. History, doomed to repeat; the cycle they hoped to break, on Carpathia.

He understands now, as he never has before, what this Cass is capable of. He underestimated him, just like Jack, just like Tate—and he knows it. Blood drains from his face.

Perhaps his life is flashing before him, too.

Julius Berger is many things, but he's not a coward. Nor a fair fighter: he barrels into Cass while he's pulling off his goggles, knocking the wind from him. He's a wildcat, scrabbling for his life, punching and kicking his way to the top. Tate ducks his head as they lunge and swerve around him, helpless to do anything but watch.

Cass pulls a gun from his belt, but Berger is on him, pitching him off his feet. Fingers claw for eyes as Cass struggles beneath him, gun skittling to the farthest corner, out of Tate's reach. An elbow in his face, and Berger is the one on his back. Cass stamps down, aiming for his chest; his foot hits concrete, surely jarring every bone in his spine, as Berger scrambles away.

Cass spits red, breathing hard. Berger is barely winded. Whatever they've done to him has enhanced his strength, as well as his vision. He shoves the table, sending Tate crashing to the ground. He lands hard, shoulder screaming. A sickly haze descends. He fights past it: when he looks again, Berger has torn a table leg from its socket. He clutches it like a baseball bat and advances menacingly on Cass. Tate, mute with horror, fights the urge to close his eyes.

He was there at the start; it's his duty to bear witness, here at the end.

But Cass is not beaten. He whips out another gun, strapped to his ankle.

"Don't make me use this, Berger..." He cocks the trigger, chest heaving. "I'm here for the president, not you. Let me 'ave him, and I'll go quietly."

"Haven't you heard, Tom? There's been a change in leadership."

"Tom's dead," says Cass. "And I'll kill you too, if I have to."

Berger laughs in his face. "Cass Cromwell doesn't _kill_ people. Cass Cromwell is a lily-livered buffoon who faints at the sight of blood. Cass Cromwell cowers under the skirts of his AC partner, while she does the shooting. Isn't that what you told me, Richard..?"

Tate makes a weak protest, but Cass doesn't blink. "Nice job at trying to stall me, waiting for reinforcements. Don't bother. I already took 'em out."

"Such a well-trained attack dog. Your master really saw you coming, didn't he?"

"I ain't asking again, you lying piece of shit. You wanna bet your life on me being that too, do ya? _Do ya_?"

"It's what you _are_ ," Berger snarls. He raises the table leg, preparing to charge. Tate shrinks into himself, time slowing as he waits for Cass to crumple under the blow; for him to fire, and cover his hands in blood once again. Another life taken, one he might never recover from.

But Cass does neither. He's Tate's protégé, after all: one move ahead. Quick as lightning, he punches Berger square in the face. Bones crunch. Blood splatters. His head snaps back, hitting the wall with a sickening thud. The table leg clunks to the floor, and Berger, strings severed, slumps after it.

"Christ, he's an arsehole." Cass cradles his hand. "You have no idea how long I've been waiting for someone to do that..."

He makes short work of the chains, and helps Tate to his feet. He has a poor poker face too; his nose wrinkles. "You finally believed it was me, then? Trust me, I get it. Really messes with your head, being banged up."

"I went back and forth. I feared I was hallucinating. That they were sending me messages in Morse code to get my hopes up. That my returning them was all part of the game..."

"I wasn't sure you'd even remember that stuff."

"I remember most things," he says. "In excruciating detail."

Cass looks curious. So be it. There are only so many secrets he's prepared to share.

He glances to Berger, motionless on the ground. "He told me they'd captured you."

"Well the bastard was spinning you a yarn. I was sitting up there, in the mountains, when the ship came down. I was waiting for you to call me, tell me you'd put Jack and his boys back in their box. I was going to signal her, when it was safe... I watched, and I waited, and then I heard screams. Gunfire." His eyes go distant, as if it reminds him of something. "I snuck back down here, to find out what was going on... I know every inch of this place, better than they do. Been creeping in and out ever since."

"Fleur?"

He shakes his head. "Couldn't fire a flare and risk this lot coming down on me. Or on them. When I ran out of water, I thought what the hell—what's the worst that can happen? Fleur ain't going to let them kill me. Time I got myself some reinforcements. I went the way they did, back to their camp, but when I got there, it was empty. Spooky, like the Mary Celeste. Don't know if they're hiding out somewhere or they took off. But they're gone, Richard. She's gone."

Tate rests a hand on his shoulder. He almost says something about the importance of faith. It freezes on his lips. "We'll see her again. Of that I have no doubt. Right now, we have to take back our city."

"Already on it. There's a group of us, up at the ACs' place. We been sneaking in, stealing supplies. Running recon. Getting a resistance going."

Tate stifles a laugh, at the irony. Cast out from Forthaven. They're all ACs, now.

"Good work. I take it you left Stella in charge?"

Cass's open face shutters up. "I saw her," he begins. He holds his hands up, forestalling Tate's next question. "She's all right. She's all right. I've not spoken to her..."

Tate readies himself for the blow. His voice sounds strangely thin, to him, when he asks, "Berger was telling the truth, about that?"

"She'll 'ave her reasons. She's running some kind of long con, she's got to be. Better on the inside, and all that..."

When Tate doesn't answer, he says, feet shuffling, "I heard what you said, you know. Well. Some of it."

"Julius wanted to take a trip down memory lane." He recovers himself. Tucks the hurt inside that locked box of secrets, where the other side of it lives. Swims on—no matter what.

"It was actually quite...cathartic. You know, I never properly thanked you, Cass... For this. For everything."

"Yeah, well, 'bout time I saved you for a change, right?" He smiles, years of history passing between them. "Enough of all the yakking. We better go, or Jack'll have my guts for garters. Be ten times harder to get out, once they raise the alarm."

Tate nods. He's unsteady, a bruise waiting to happen, but he's not broken. He stretches out his limbs, tests them gingerly. His shoulder throbs, wrists ringed with welts. His legs are like straw, but they're in working order. It'll be a long road back to fitness. But it could be much, much worse.

Cass retrieves his missing gun. He rolls Berger over with a toe, just to check. He flops like a starfish, tongue hanging out: a fallen king. Tate will see him again. He has no doubt about that, either.

"Funny thing," Cass says, checking the safety, "I could only get the keys for the handcuffs. I came all prepared to blow the door. When I got here, it was already open. I guess they forgot to lock it..."

He shrugs, heads out. Tate takes out the drawing. It's real: not real. He cuts it loose, lets it flutter to the floor, as he follows Cass. Daylight greets him, sweet and lambent. He pauses on the threshold, on his way out, and looks back at the cell.

There's nothing there. Not a thing he can see. But he can feel _something_ , watching him. A dispassionate observer; waiting to see what he'll do with his freedom. He has a feeling the answer to that will seal all of their fates. He's responsible for the future of the human race, and he intends to see it through. He will do whatever it takes, as he always has, to ensure his survival.

Richard Tate is a lot more like Julius Berger, sometimes, than he ever wanted to believe.

"It's going to get interesting," he promises. The shadows receive it with a satisfied ripple. Somewhere nearby, birds are singing. He accepts Cass's helping hand, leading him out of darkness, into the battle for Carpathia; into another new life.

  


Tate steps back into the light—and lets it begin.


End file.
